UBS Lands $9M “Big Kahuna” from Credit Suisse in Texas

UBS Wealth Management Americas is once again thumbing its nose at Credit Suisse and Wells Fargo, signing up an advisor in Dallas this week who produced an estimated $9 million last year.

David Barnes, who ranked #6 on Barron’s 2015 list of top financial advisors in Texas with $1.3 billion of assets under management, rejoined UBS on Monday after more than six years at Credit Suisse’s so-called “private banking” group in the U.S.

He had worked at UBS’s Dallas office from late 2001 through April 2009, when he began his stint at Credit Suisse Private Banking. Credit Suisse AG last year decided to shutter the U.S. brokerage business as part of a broad restructuring.

“He was the biggest producer in the State of Texas for CS the last 9 years,” a source who formerly worked at Credit Suisse and saw production runs wrote to us late last week. “His T12 [trailing 12-month production] was $9 million,…and it was well known he was the biggest producer. I heard many times he was being heavily recruited by UBS, ML & MS….Rumor is it was a major bidding war.”

Referring to Barnes as the Lone Star State’s Big Kahuna, the source waxed poetic about the advisor’s certifications and his annual holiday party at his “Highland Park mansion.”

The star value of Barnes, who also has worked as an adviser at Goldman Sachs, was enhanced by his fee-based business-lending practice, according to our source.

Barnes did not respond to requests for comment. According to FINRA’s BrokerCheck, which says he has no disclosure events, he began at UBS on January 20.

The move rubs salt into the deal Credit Suisse negotiated last year giving Wells Fargo Advisors first crack at recruiting the Swiss bank’s approximately 170 U.S. brokers. Wells, which has not announced a hire from Credit Suisse since disclosing the arrangement in October, is now downplaying the benefits of the arrangement.

UBS, on the other hand, has been aggressively recruiting CS teams, accenting its long-term deals with upfront cash generally higher than Wells has been offering. Its hiring spree has been so intense that UBS filed a raiding claim against its Swiss rival in December with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. UBS has reportedly recruited more than 70 CS brokers.

Raiding claims are unusual in the era of the Broker Protocol that is designed to reduce litigation costs, and even more so when done by a company that has told advisors to circulate their resumes because it was closing the business.

The claim also does not appear to be intimidating UBS. Several sources have told us that UBS Wealth Americas will be hiring a few senior sales managers from Credit Suisse once their garden leaves expire toward midyear. UBS also has hired several advisers from the U.S. brokerage division that Deutsche Bank is closing down, and is expected to bring in another Deutsche adviser in the southwestern U.S. next week.